Elden Ring - Shadow of the Erdtree Expansion Announced

[Ste Pickford]

28 minutes ago, John0 said:

 

Yes this! This was such a nice little cue once I found it. You kinda need to be able to take a couple though first in order to spot that kind of thing. At least I did.

 

Edit: posted this before but here's my fight for anyone currently struggling. Really did like this one.
 

 

 

That was a joy to watch!  Nice skills.

[Alask]

Last boss / fashion-souls spoiler..

 

Spoiler

I have equipped my very best armor for holy resistance and it’s not helping!! 

 

Got to the Elden beast phase once. I need more padding.

 

[John0]

5 minutes ago, Ste Pickford said:

That was a joy to watch!  Nice skills.

 

Cheers Ste! It took a lot of attempts haha. But I don't really mind fighting over and over as long as I'm enjoying the fight. When you go from kinda seeing what you need to be able to do to actually doing it and beating something that felt super hard at first.. that's the best feeling in these games for me! Does mean it's taken me a hell of a lot of hours to get as far as some have done in half the time.

I listened to the podcast that Jamie John recommended at they talk about how some FROM games can feel very prescriptive at times. As in, you need to be able to do this like this or you can't progress. And ER is very much feels like a departure from that (due to how viable lots of different builds and, and how you can ignore/run past a LOT of fights). But I think I actually like the prescriptive aspect of it. I like having a set goal and (as long as it doesn't literally feel impossible) working towards it. Super rewarding.

 

Said it before, but I'm really loving the shield based combat in this. Guard counter makes a huge difference. Feels a liiiitle bit like you're getting all the advantage of a parry with none of the timing but you still have to watch your stamina bar very closely, and you need to line them up and know when and where to go for them. And crucially it gets you playing more aggressively with a shield - providing that link between defence and attack. Really nice addition overall I think - just hope it hasn't made parrying a bit obsolete.

[Davros sock drawer]

45 minutes ago, John0 said:

 

Yes this! This was such a nice little cue once I found it. You kinda need to be able to take a couple though first in order to spot that kind of thing. At least I did.

 

Edit: posted this before but here's my fight for anyone currently struggling. Really did like this one.
 

 

 

Very patient and skilled fight, which I presume you had to be as your sword was doing a very low amount of damage. What was it, a Longsword +3 or something!?

 

Very well done though, kudos.

[Kevvy Metal]

49 minutes ago, John0 said:

 

Yes this! This was such a nice little cue once I found it. You kinda need to be able to take a couple though first in order to spot that kind of thing. At least I did.

 

Edit: posted this before but here's my fight for anyone currently struggling. Really did like this one.
 

 

 

Great fight! Looked like great fun! 
What level was your long sword at?

[John0]

9 minutes ago, Davros sock drawer said:

Very patient and skilled fight, which I presume you had to be as your sword was doing a very low amount of damage. What was it, a Longsword +3 or something!?

 

Very well done though, kudos.

 

6 minutes ago, Kevvy Metal said:

Great fight! Looked like great fun! 
What level was your long sword at?

 

Cheers haha.. I think it was +13 or 14 at the time (actually could have been less thinking about it). I know there's better and I've tried to move away from it but I honestly haven't found anything else I've liked as much. I like the moveset and like getting in and trying to get out without taking damage, which seems much harder with the bigger stuff as the swings all take too long. So maybe I'm a DEX person? But I've tried that and lack of strength means when I do take damage I seem to be taking way too much of it. Which makes learning fights harder. So I've stuck with this weird Stength based Heavy Longsword build that I don't really know what it is but also don't want to move away from! Also taking on all these giant monsters with just a normal longsword is kinda fun to me.

[Benny]

Thanks to a post in the Edge mag thread that made me think about it again, I've realised just how clever the skulls are: a constant source of XP for just pratting about without you having to think about it.

[Benny]

Oh and those catacombs, my god. Like, imagine a map filled with "towers" or whatever else passes for an excuse of an activity in an open world game these days: in basically everything else these will be the same every time, go there, climb it, tick off the box etc.

 

Even Red Dead Redemption 2, which by all measures has a truly gorgeous and organic seeming world, doesn't engage you with it directly outside of hunting or the exploration for its own sake. You do that in ER too, but when you actually get to those catacombs, every single one is a differently designed little level with its own unique tricks, traps and bespoke design that you have to figure out and work your way through.

 

It's madness. Absolute madness.

[Uncle Nasty]

Went for a walk at lunchtime and:

 

 

It's Miyazaki's world, we just live in it.

 

 

[Lovelyman]

I think the teleporting and size of the overworld is slightly - very slightly - to the game's detriment. 

 

I was playing it last night and I felt like I was there - a great sense of continuity and place.

 

But I found myself hankering for the feeling of tentatively exploring Darkroot, with the commitment that necessitated. 

 

Elden Ring is amazing, but I wonder how it would have been if the overworld was a little bit more concise so that you didn't need the horse and teleporting immediately. 

 

Maybe for me it would be better, but I wonder if I am the minority.

[Cyhwuhx]

Just now, Lovelyman said:

I think the teleporting and size of the overworld is slightly - very slightly - to the game's detriment. 

 

I was playing it last night and I felt like I was there - a great sense of continuity and place.

 

But I found myself hankering for the feeling of tentatively exploring Darkroot, with the commitment that necessitated. 

 

Elden Ring is amazing, but I wonder how it would have been if the overworld was a little bit more concise so that you didn't need the horse and teleporting immediately. 

 

Maybe for me it would be better, but I wonder if I am the minority.

 

I'm being continually amazed at how the world feels to be the perfect size. Large enough to get lost in, small enough to quickly get around. There's just enough friction to keep it meaningful.

[5R7]

Playing through again, with a new character.

 

Seems radahn was defo nerfed in the latest patch, he was easy, just resummon the summons lol

 

But,  the wrong warp still works! So that was a nice quick hop to a hard place for the level in at 😂

[Uzi]

Mal Mal the fucker is finally down! Instead of butting my head against trying to dodge and outplay her, I won with being a smart sneaky asshole by using another guy from youtubes mimic set up! Basically wore the tankiest armor in the game, put on the talisman that gives you more poise which got to 130ish poise, wore two seals for incantations (one to buff a kinda spell, the other for scaling) and put on two spells, one AOE offensive and one powerful heal spell. Then called my mimic, took off the heavy armour, put on my shield and sword and just hid behind my mimic occasionally getting in a R1 combo with a safe opening. Mimic kept her aggrod for 90 percent of the fight! Yassss

 

Spoiler

 

 

[Steely]

 

I've never played a Souls game before and it shows.  (Especially after seeing the precision in John's video.)

 

Im about 26 hours in, I've only just made it past Godrick and after exploring the wonders of the castle for a while I was feeling overly confident, so I gunned it north to go get that Archer Spell I've been pining after for so long.

 

Put it this way I did Goldrich in 2 attempts. This guy, I say 24 in the tweet but I wasn't counting, it could have been comfortably more...  I was at it for about an hour and a half. 

 

Any advice would be welcome.

[Jamie John]

I got to Mt Gelmir last night at just a few levels shy of 100, and I definitely feel over-powered now. I'm riding around with my +19 (or something) Sacred Morning Star, happily stoving in skulls for 700+ damage per hit and one-shotting most enemies. This must be what @CrichStand felt like for the first ten hours of his playthrough 

 

Bosses, too, have been a cakewalk since Godrick, really. Not one of them has taken more than a handful of attempts. I know I sound like I'm bragging and I'll soon be eating my words, but being able to just brute force my way through enemies with Golden Slam or by pelting them with super-charged lighting bolts while Oleg distracts them feels a bit...cheap on my part. It's almost enough to make me pine for the tension of some of Sekiro's duels.

 

Of course, I could just not use summons, or arrows, or lightning bolts, or anything else that the game gives you to give you an advantage over tough encounters, but then I'd feel like I was just artificially extending the game's length by forcing myself to go mano a mano with every single boss and painstakingly learn all their moves, like I did with Margit. Especially when there are so many bosses, and the game is so massive already.

 

I'm going to finish rinsing the Atlus Plateau and then head for Caelid. Maybe the big R, who I've heard so much about, will mercilessly punish my hubris, although since it sounds like he's been nerfed, I'm not so sure...

[jonamok]

@Steely You did fine. Bravo.

[joemul]

4 hours ago, Uncle Nasty said:

 

Only 1 better than Forza Horizon 5? FROM was robbed.

Is this the absolute pain in the arse in the tower east of the Lakes? I need to go back to her at some point - could barely get close to her

[therearerules]

2 minutes ago, joemul said:

Is this the absolute pain in the arse in the tower east of the Lakes? I need to go back to her at some point - could barely get close to her

I admit I'm not as far in as some people, but I'll be shocked if Forza Horizon 5 is a secret boss.

[joemul]

Ha. I’m an idiot. 

[Stopharage]

Can anyone tell me roughly how far through I am? Like to explore and get most quests/areas done and have just completed the Academy inc. boss. 

[Captain Kelsten]

2 minutes ago, Stopharage said:

Can anyone tell me roughly how far through I am? Like to explore and get most quests/areas done and have just completed the Academy inc. boss. 

25% maybe. Possibly less. Definitely less if you’re going to do everything in every area. 

[Stopharage]

2 minutes ago, Doctor Shark said:

25% maybe. Possibly less. Definitely less if you’re going to do everything in every area. 

Bloody hell. Sold my PS5 because I couldn’t see it getting a look-in for the significant, might have to look to getting sacked to get the time to play through this. 

[Qazimod]

MtBB down! I had the opposite to my good fortune in an earlier boss battle - this time my ashes summon got the kill as I died, but it didn't count the kill.  Eventually I did it though.

 

I think as a boss fight it's...okay. You can improve to a point where most of BC's attacks won't touch you. But the speed and unpredictability of MtBB, combined with the side effect where 

 

Spoiler

your health drains and your health bar shortens

 

make it pretty rough for a slow Strength boi. I wasn't able to break down any sure-fire tactics like I had done with SR and MtfO, but learning to roll through "projectiles" and finding the punishable attacks helped. In particular...

 

Spoiler

Phase 1 has that slow stab done from a standing position, and that thing where the blade is scraped on the floor in a red circle. Both feel like freebies. Phase 2 has a leaping ground stab after a double somersault which has a lot of recovery, but you need to avoid confusing it with the leaping stab that has an explosion afterwards. And so on.

 

It's nowhere near as infuriating as GD, but even that got better once you knew what items to use. MtBB is much more of a skill check.

[Broker]

6 hours ago, Flub said:

Could someone tell me which part of the world is best for somber stone 7s? I have plenty of 8s and 9s but struggling for 7s.

The lil hand spiders in the mountaintops drop them. 

[Number 28]

I just remembed I haven't found a single treasure from those paintings you find. I think I've only found about five of them. I'll probably just look them up rather than aimlessly wander for hours. Do they result in anything good? If it's just more smithing stones...

[Girth Certificate]

I got an Ash of War for the one I managed to find, can't actually remember if it was any good or not  

[Captain Kelsten]

The last boss is properly killing my enthusiasm for the game. I couldn’t get him down as strength so I’ve gone faith and, whilst it’s a little better, it’s still not great. Making me not want to play! 
 

I’ve smashed every other boss in two or three goes (apart from Malenia who took a while longer), but once the last boss gets to phase 2, I just can’t keep close enough to keep the damage up. It’s not a fun boss, imo. 

[Number 28]

10 minutes ago, Girth Certificate said:

I got an Ash of War for the one I managed to find, can't actually remember if it was any good or not  

Yeah, there's a lot of items in this game which I feel good about collecting and I'll no doubt go around collecting them, but I have zero inclination to actually use stuff. I'm just a hoarder I guess.

[Laters]

On 21/03/2022 at 01:48, Uzi said:

Turned out I had missed one optional area (of the infamous bird farming spot) so went back and just mopped up the boss there who went down pretty easy but dropped around 400k runes??

 

 

What boss is that? I've been hanging around that area recently.

[Uzi]

8 minutes ago, Totoro said:

 

 

What boss is that? I've been hanging around that area recently.

Spoiler

https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Mohg,+Lord+of+Blood

Drops 420k